Jindřich Štyrský The Sexual Revue

Štyrský, Jindřich. Sexuální revue [The Sexual Revue]. Prague: private printing, c. 1940/41. 32 pp. 8vo, contemporary blue cloth, spine lettered in gilt “Sexuální revue,” upper board with gilt erotic vignette. Issued as a private printing in a strictly limited edition, this copy numbered 70. Illustrated with three striking erotic line drawings by V. H. Brunner (1886–1928), reproduced as clichés, together with an etched erotic frontispiece by Achille Devéria (1833). Erotic bookplate mounted to front pastedown. Includes Přiznání mladé ženy [The Confessions of a Young Woman] by Prosper Jolyot de Crebillon, Flirt by Pierre de Bourdeilles, Chanson sans honneur (anon), Černošský tanec [The Black Dance] by Rétif de la Bretonne, Zažitek z cesty [An Experience from the Trip] by Guy de Maupassant, Jen slovy vznítite žár [Words Alone Can Ignite the Flames] by Paul Perret. Bound together with Prof. Dr. Ot. Nováček: Ňadra (Prague, Ladislav Janů, n.d. [1930s], 47 pp., printed by Václav Palán; limited to 300 numbered and signed copies - this copy not signed or numbered). Very good condition. Light wear to boards, tear to upper hinge, but still binding still strong. A scarce clandestine Czech erotic revue, privately circulated to evade censorship, and closely connected with the surrealist circle of Jindřich Štyrský and his Edition 69. The combination of Devéria’s 19th-century engraving with Brunner’s modernist typographic-erotic drawings exemplifies the avant-garde strategy of recontextualizing older erotica within a contemporary framework. Inv.: I1